What are the ideas behind the solution and how it works?

There are accelerating changes in our world, lives become more complex, unstable, unpredictable and volatile by variety of causes including global climate. The level of uncertainty about the long-term future is increasing and far greater than at any time despite all achievements of our civilization.

These powerful irreversible trends challenge our capacity to manage the change, understand flow of events, the content and consequences of processes which directly impact our businesses, families, environment and our options in selecting right response for desirable outcomes.

The Portal Central introduces customers to Pharos Navigator as innovative Information Technology platform for universal unified monitoring and management of complex dynamic systems and variety of relevant services. Everyone who needs better understanding of flow of events in business and own life may apply these digital services to improve capacity to explore the content of change, its dynamics and trends and become better prepared to cope with it, develop own responses in times of uncertainty and mitigate growing challenges.

Daily business management of private and public organizations requires handling conflicting issues of operational efficiency, performance, sustainability and compliance to stakeholder interests. The Pharos Navigator platform facilitates owners and managers improving their capacity to monitor and analyze necessary business objects and processes in variety of diverse applications in near real time, having it convenient and simple as a gadget. 

The platform software, its various components, learning, business partnerships and applications are available to all Portal Members in unified form of subscription services. It includes as follows:

• Free downloading, installing and running of enterprise server and client software for getting to know, learning and developing own applications
• Expanding available functions and features by adding various applications to the server (e.g. sample enterprises, benchmarking, business analytics, advanced data mining, etc).
• Learning how to use the services effectively for improving business results, making lives more systematic, controllable and predictable
• Sharing experiences and supporting other users in their implementations
• Finding regional and local support for those who needs advice and assistance in learning and application development for their business
• Advertising own training, consulting and application development services by those who has knowledge and capacity to provide assistance and support to regional and national customers
• Becoming a certified partner, exploring and developing own business in consulting, training, development of customized applications
• Subscribing to various additional information services which are expanding continuously
• Ensuring effective and secure implementation of services to organizations, their rights for data ownership, its protection in management of change.

The services are available under the agreement with Terms of Services and in accordance with Privacy Policy.

What are the ideas behind the solution and how it works?

Any modern organization of people is a complex, multi-dimensional and unique system having variety of internal and external objects continuously changing over time. Such objects include employees, machinery and instruments, departments, e.g. production floor, sales, transportation, as well as partners, customers, suppliers as well organization as a whole.

Organizational processes need integrity, be measured up in reality, increasingly monitored providing a comprehensive picture from holistic view to small issues which occasionally can quickly grow into large cause of problems. The achievements and results provide data evidence of the past has to be taken into consideration while formulating the development concepts for the future. The desirable future needs formulation of options in developments, risks and resilience strategies to mitigate uncertainty.

Most of such objects have dynamic properties called “Key indicators” which represent various “processes” of object change. The combination of actual values of each such property at any particular moment of time results in some object state which is defined by and for people in convenient common human terms such as “OK”, “Normal”, “Under control”, “Bad”, Out of Order”, etc.

Having principal problems in dealing with multiple flows of information people developed impressive capacity to replace the object complexity by using the combination of two object properties “Object Name” and “Object State” in understanding and exchange of information about them. The common examples are “This business is in a good shape” or “They failed but recovering now”, “Sales are great”, “The conveyer is in repair”, “The employee efficiency is not sufficient”.  

This highly compressed resulting information like “Good”, “Bad” or “Out of order”, “Acceptable”, “Not-appropriate”, “Stable”, “Right”, “Wrong”, etc. is sufficient for human beings to answer the main question:

The Pharos Navigator facilitates and expands ability of management and specialists to have the right answers to this question in variety of practical life matters and in their analysis of relevant content.

The operation in brief

The Pharos Navigator enterprise server automatically

• reads measurements from relevant data sources defined by local users regarding each object of monitoring
• calculates all object indicators defined by local users as its dynamic parameters
• identifies current state of each indicator as defined by local users
• identifies current object state as defined by local users
• stores results in local enterprise database
• promptly updates all authorized users monitoring particular objects and processes
• presents various instruments for analysis and preparation of decisions using the data about object change store locally in server database.

The information is sent to common user devices such as tablets, notebooks, personal computers and mobile phones in near real time and presented in a way easy for understanding and interpretation.

The users are empowered to customize and adapt all operations to their needs including

• Definition of objects
• Its optional states and rules of transition
• Formulating necessary indicators and their formulas
• Selecting sources of data for indicators
• Presenting the results on user devices.

After importing every new measurement data the server runs calculations of multiple indicators and objects which are influenced by this information, identifies current state of each object at particular moment of time and sent detailed updates to all users authorized to monitor and analyze the object.

The presentation of object state and its relevant details is made interactively in secure Pharos Navigator client applications “Monitor” and “Reports” running on user devices such as tables, notebooks, mobiles.

The Pharos Navigator enterprise platform allows monitoring of the whole organization, its divisions, products and services, customers and suppliers, sales and production, employees and machines as well as business partners under the following conditions:

• There are measurements of target object properties implemented continuously and periodically e.g. in departments, branches, etc.
• The relevant source data is saved in some electronic storage, e.g. application like MS Excel, Calc (OpenOffice/LibreOffice), databases, etc.
• Pharos Navigator server can access the data storage via some communication network to import the source data (e.g. Internet or WLAN/LAN, cellular, etc)
• Object indicators describing objects properties are formulated and tested by local users
• The set of optional each object states and rules of transition between these states is formulated by local users

The Pharos Navigator allows automatic adaptation of the object dynamic parameters to its unknown behavior and facilitates development of user knowledge about change of object indicator targets. 

The results are stored in the database on the server and used for variety of related applications including business analytics, data mining, etc.

The platform supports implementation of major international standards including as follows:

• ISO 9000 and ISO 9001 Quality Management
• ISO 14000 Environmental management
• ISO 15504 Information technology — Process assessment
• ISO 17025 General requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories
• OHSAS 18000, Health and Safety
• ISO 19011 Management systems auditing
• ISO 26000 Social Responsibility for Sustainable Development
• ISO 31000 Risk management
• ISO 50001 Energy management

The sample enterprise as object

The examples of objects are available in the portal as “Sample demos”. Some of them are provided with server software download as a object templates or as add on services.

The first sample presents manufacturing enterprise “Modern Interiors Factory” producing furniture sets. Its indicators include Sales, Customers, Production, Quality, Customer service index, Performance, Revenue, Expenses, Profits as well as optional definitions of efficiency and productivity. The business data are real and based on one of case studies implemented in Pharos Business Navigator for UNIDO between 1998-2008.

The Portal Central visitors can use examples for analyzing the application content and considering own objects development. After subscribing to service and installing the server locally one can use the sample to make own objects for his/her business and industry. It includes identification of indicators reflecting local technologies, ways of running business, sources of energy, environment, pollution, etc., everything necessary to meet requirements of enterprise management, its owners or stakeholders.

Additionally Pharos Navigator platform may be applied to monitoring and analyzing of

• Groups of organizations integrated under single supervision or ownership
• Developments in particular geographic regions and/or industries providing powerful managerial and analytic tool for stakeholders.
• Environment including urban areas, regions, etc.
• Urban areas life quality 
• Healthcare 
  
• Social developments
• Education (learning of new high tech digital applications in IT, quality of educational services, training, etc) 

Welcome to new digital world of measuring and analyzing objects of your life!